Utah as a home to PGA TOUR golf? You bet

The state of Utah is where—get ready for this little piece of trivia—the oldest, continually running golf tournament in the world takes place each year.

Yes, the Utah State Amateur holds that distinction over any other tournament going. It started in 1899 and has never skipped a year, not for the Spanish flu pandemic of 1918 and 1919 that coincided with World War I, not for the early 1940s with World War II raging and not for the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic. Its streak is at 125 consecutively played tournaments.

Take that Open Championship, U.S. Amateur and U.S. Open, Australian Open, Canadian Open and, well, everybody else.

Past Utah State Amateur winners include current PGA TOUR players Tony Finau (the 2006 champion), Zac Blair (2009) and Patrick Fishburn (2016).

Utah is also the long-time home of the Korn Ferry Tour. In 1990, the then-named Ben Hogan Tour tabbed Provo as an original tournament site for its first season, awarding the Utah Classic to Riverside Country Club. John Daly won that inaugural tournament a year before he burst on the national scene by winning the PGA Championship.

The Utah Classic stayed in Provo for seven iterations, took a couple of years off and then moved to the Salt Lake City suburb of Sandy for a 16-year run as the newly christened Utah Championship. The tournament eventually moved 20 minutes south, to Lehi, for a couple of years (2015 and 2016) when its home—Willow Creek Country Club—underwent renovations. It then moved permanently, in 2017, to Farmington’s Oakridge Country Club, a straight shot north on Interstate 15, where the tournament has remained since. Australian Karl Vilips is the most recent champion, winning in August.

Even PGA TOUR Champions had a 21-tournament Utah run, in Park City, playing under various names before calling it quits in 2002.

The PGA TOUR, though? Yeah, it’s been a while.

Try 61 years. The PGA TOUR fun ended on Sept. 8, 1963, when Tommy Jacobs walked off the 18th green at the Salt Lake Country Club as the Utah Open champion. The TOUR packed up the traveling road show and headed to Seattle for the next tournament, and that was that. No tournament in 1964, 1965, 1966 ...

That six-decade-plus Beehive State drought ends this week a little more than 300 miles south of where Jacobs won.

The first annual Black Desert Championship is in Ivins, a city of less than 10,000 people tucked among the red rocks in the southernmost part of the state.

The Black Desert Championship will be the ninth official PGA TOUR tournament held in Utah and the first contested outside of Salt Lake City.

How did the previous eight PGA TOUR tournaments shake out? Here’s a review.

1930 Salt Lake Open

• Salt Lake Country Club
• Winner: Harry Cooper
• Highlights: Olin Dutra looked poised to win Utah’s first professional golf event of its kind. Dutra held a four-shot lead with six holes to play after birdies at Nos. 10, 11 and 13 during the 36-hole final day. Harry Cooper reduced his deficit to one shot through No. 16 but was still one back of Dutra with a hole remaining. Playing the 18th hole Sunday, Cooper reached the par 5 in two. Meanwhile, Dutra hit his 3-wood approach into the large ravine fronting the closing hole. He struggled to get out and eventually made a double bogey-7 while Cooper was two-putting for birdie, giving Copper a two-shot triumph.

1937 Utah Open

• Fort Douglas Country Club
• Winner: Al Zimmerman
• Highlights: It was all Zimmerman all the time Sunday, with Al and Emery, brothers from Portland, battling it out at the golf course above the University of Utah campus at the base of the Wasatch Mountains. In the end, Al enjoyed a wire-to-wire win. He opened with a 5-under 67 to lead by two. He maintained that advantage through 36 holes then finished 72-68 to coast to a five-stroke win over his brother and local favorite George Schneiter.

1938 Utah Open

• Salt Lake Country Club
• Winner: Al Zimmerman
• Highlights: Down by a stroke and standing on the 18th tee in Monday’s 18-hole, three-man playoff, Zimmerman, playing alongside Charley Shepherd and Salt Lake City’s Tee Branca, locked up his second consecutive Utah Open title when he piped his drive down the fairway then put his par-5 approach onto the green, 30 feet from the pin. From there, he rolled in the eagle putt to coast past Shepherd and win by a shot.

1947 Western Open

• Salt Lake Country Club
• Winner: Johnny Palmer
• Highlights: Celebrating the 100th anniversary of the Mormon pioneers’ arrival in Utah, the Western Golf Association staged the Western Open in Utah for the first—and only—time as part of the state’s celebration. North Carolina’s Johnny Palmer took a share of the opening-round lead but trailed Bob Hamilton and Ed Oliver by three through 36 holes. Ahead after the third round, following a tournament-low 64, Palmer overcame a 71st-hole bogey by making a 7-foot par putt at the last to hold off by a stroke South Africa’s Bobby Locke.

1948 Utah Open

• Fort Douglas Country Club
• Winner: Lloyd Mangrum
• Highlights: Mangrum and George Fazio finished regulation tied at 14-under, and that forced an 18-hole Monday playoff. In overtime, Mangrum never trailed, making only three birdies but capitalizing on Fazio’s mistakes—bogeys at Nos. 8, 11 and 13. Mangrum shot a 3-under 69, his fourth 69 of what turned out to be 90 holes of golf. He opened with a 67 that ultimately led to his seventh and final victory of the season, where he finished second on the money list behind Ben Hogan.

1958 Utah Open

• Salt Lake Country Club
• Winner: Dow Finsterwald
• Highlights: Six weeks after winning the PGA Championship, Finsterwald was winning again, coming from behind on the final day with a back-nine charge that allowed him to catch and eventually defeat Fred Hawkins by a stroke. Tied with only the 18th hole to play, Hawkins faced a 7-foot birdie putt that he missed. That opened the door for Finsterwald, who calmly poured in his 4-foot birdie putt to take the title.

1960 Utah Open

• Salt Lake Country Club
• Winner: Bill Johnston
• Highlights: Competing just five miles from the University of Utah campus, where he played college golf, Johnston fired a final-round 63—the low round of the year by a winner—to capture his second TOUR title (to go with his 1958 Texas Open win). Johnston secured the victory by hitting his second-shot approach on the par-5 18th hole in the final round to seven feet. From there, he made eagle to break free and beat Art Wall by two shots.

1963 Utah Open

• Salt Lake Country Club
• Winner: Tommy Jacobs
• Highlights: Thanks to a third-round, 10-under 62, Tommy Jacobs took a three-stroke advantage into the final round, leading Don January and Gary Player. And despite a bogey on the 71st hole and a double bogey at the last, Jacobs had built enough of a cushion to be able to give up three late strokes and still hang on for the one-shot triumph over January.

PGA TOUR history in Utah